Telecommunications are an essential part of the global political economy, and the private telecommunications sector is driving much of the transformation across Africa. Yet the regulatory frameworks governing the relationships between African governments and these corporations remain hazy.Focusing on South Africa’s flagship mobile network operators (MNOs), MTN and Vodacom, this open access book provides unique insights into this thin boundary between corporatism and many African states’ global relationships. Drawing on rich archival research, company data, and reports from the South African parliament and Department of International Relations and Cooperation, Odilile uncovers how information and communications technology (ICT) companies have taken advantage of epoch-shifting periods in South Africa’s history, from the end of the Cold War to the end of Apartheid. In so doing, she sheds new light on the wider issues of the politics of the multinational corporation, of foreign investment, and of state-corporation relations across Africa and beyond.The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by the Bloomsbury Open Collections Library Collective.
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PrefaceIntroductionChapter 1: Embedding the Telcos: The Story of Telephony in AfricaChapter 2: Global Technopolitics: A View From the SouthChapter 3: South African Corporate Expansion: A Historical PerspectiveChapter 4: South African Corporate Expansion in the Democratic DispensationChapter 5: The Birth of MTNChapter 6: Vodacom: South African Brand, Foreign Company?Conclusion
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A critical analysis of how Vodacom and MTN interact with South African foreign policy and what this says about the politics of mobile telephony proliferation across Africa.
Draws on unique, rich empirical data to offer a timely interpretation of the role MTN and Vodacom play in Africa’s intra-continental and domestic politics

Produktdetaljer

ISBN
9781350411777
Publisert
2024-09-19
Utgiver
Vendor
Zed Books Ltd
Høyde
234 mm
Bredde
156 mm
Aldersnivå
P, 06
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Innbundet
Antall sider
216

Forfatter

Biographical note

Odilile Ayodele is a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Pan-African Thought and Conversation (IPATC) at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Her research focuses on the international relations of technology and digital diplomacy in Africa.